The Lover's Requital
by fallintotoday
Summary: What exactly had transpired between Sibbi Black-briar, Svidi, and her brother? What drove Sibbi to murder? Were there secrets to keep? An image to maintain? Pure blood-lust? This story dives a little too deeply (perhaps) into the little side quest Sibbi gives the Dragonborn. Enjoy!
1. Chapter 1

After fourteen months, she returns to the city of Riften to be greeted by a familiarly rugged face. His dark features and cold, gray eyes look at her in their hungry way, though today she is feeling more yielding. Her black-leathered feet pad towards him assertively, and his shoulders turn to her with purpose. One side of his weathered lips turns upward as he detects her new found coolness. She matches this look, her tightly bound feminine figure swaying in its new armor. He licks his lips, consuming her with his steely gaze; she is taller, grown with maturation and enhanced with heeled boots; exposed, the dark leather binds her curves and is cut to expose her cleavage; aloof, her eyebrows have since been groomed and arch highly above her icy blue eyes which have been frozen with experience. She is surely not the innocent daughter of a blacksmith anymore. And, he is not the naïve footpad of the Thieve's Guild. They have both grown tired, and are in search of an easy, though short, release.

What brought them together that night was not the tender warmth of love, but a colder need: one of pure, unemotional lust. It is a hunger between two who possess the looks, but not the feeling. She had grown bitter and disbelieving; he had grown detached and superior. Their actions were betraying their fathers and their Gods; their partners and themselves. In the end, both were satisfied. They lay on the hard stone floor of the city, not embracing, but embarrassed. Their eyes and lips did not meet as they hurriedly dressed; both rushed on by the coming dawn. To both, if the light should rise above Riften's fortified walls and illuminate their faults and their faces, these four: Fathers, Gods, Partners, and Self would become wise to their character and be equally disappointed. So they dressed and they parted as quickly as they had met, but the dark is not as forgiving or as concealing as one would think.

First, their frowning Gods, all knowing, would resolve to give them nothing further than ill-favor and misfortune. Whether by their hand or none, his shadowy Partner would be alerted next. Anger and betrayal would pour down from his Partner's eyes, and her lips would tell Father of his daughter's sin. Then, confronted by their miseries, follows Self. Guilt, pity, anger, and sadness would all gnash their teeth into these unfortunate's souls.

He, further down a path of darkness and possessing a more stone-like character than his partner, would retreat obediently but remain essentially the same, still capable of repeating his past mistakes. He would ignore his Self, apologise to Father, appease his Partner, but remain sinful in the eyes of his Gods as he has not learned from his mistake. She, the becoming age of eighteen and not sure of who or what she is meant to be, will be central to the coming tale, and he will be of little more significance, or perhaps it all.

No words can express the hurt a person feels once emotionally betrayed by their partner. Little trust remains, though a certain type of person may be able to achieve forgiveness, and take back a little of the faith lost. Whether that requires strength, naivety, or this elusive thing people call 'true love' is uncertain. All that can be said is the woman called Vex possessed it. How she forgave her partner, Maul, in his bonding with another woman was beyond most, but it had occurred. This occurrence was not without its flaws; and perhaps appeared futile to the nosy onlooker, but Vex was a zealous woman, and she couldn't let her image be tarnished by the whims of a younger woman.

Her revenge was swift, and, after the girl had left the alleyway to go about her day, Vex immediately appeared out of the shadows and confronted her lover. She presented her ultimatum: 'Continue your business with her, and I shall end her life without remorse.' The choice was clear; this bonding, which had been brief and did not have the obligation of longevity, could be and had intended to be easily abandoned. Little more did he have to say about it beyond that, and he used even fewer words. This news, and Vex's threat, reached the ears of our eighteen year old within the hour, just before she was to retire for bed. It came by the angry fist of her father pounding on her bedroom door some ten minutes before the morning was to break over the city's walls.

"Dee!" His roaring voice bellowed deeply from beneath his twitching chest as he resisted the urge to break the planks of his daughter's door apart. "Get your ass out of bed before I drag you out!"

Svidi's body froze solid before she could pull back the furs that would allow her to dream away the whole event. She knew that he knew she was there, but for the moment she remained still as her mind wondered if he truly knew she had returned. Another thick fist connecting with the door rattled her out of this stupor, and her mind reeled back at her father's rage. How he had learned so quickly about the situation was mystifying, but the consequences were imminent and she was not the gutless girl she was before. As her thumb depressed the latch on her door, she imagined her return playing out in a drastically different way, the way she had imagined it would go not one minute before, before the circumstances had changed it. She could almost feel the strong, muscled arms of her father holding her after a year away, but now she feared they would swing down upon her in their fury.

"Hello, dad." Svidi simpered, her tiny fingers picking nervously at each other as her face twisted up with regret. She had matured over the long months she had gone, but a father was imposing and no mattered how hardened one could become, you were always as threatening as a mouse in front of your own. "I'm back."

Balimund's eyes were puffy like he had just been violently woken up, and his blonde moustache jerked about as he filtered through his emotions. He was relieved she had come home safely, disappointed she had not written to him in the year she had disappeared, and angry to have found a thief on his doorstep, declaring his daughter's less than honorable homecoming. He stood balling and relaxing his fists, glaring down at his daughter as he decided upon which emotion would be his priority. Ultimately, his anger, curiosity, and his protective nature got the best of him, though the bite in his voice was softened by the timing.

"Can you tell me why you've…spoiled yourself not ten steps from the guards, this morning?" His jaw bunched up with the stress that came from the uncomfortable situation in talking with a daughter about intimacy, and his eyes drifted towards a spot on the wall just above her shoulder. Though intending to look intimidating, his feet shifted uncomfortably underneath his great weight. Even a large man like Balimund felt like running back to his bed where he could pretend to have never woken up, never learned what he had, and never confronted his daughter with these words.

Svidi's fragile composure almost resulted in a nervous giggle had she not possessed more sense. His words were an unusual thing, and she felt childish needing to explain her motivation behind committing the act she had. "It's been over a year since you've last seen me, Father, and I've grown with it." Her father visibly winced, his shoulders shuddering as these loaded words contained more than he wanted to know.

"I should've expected as much, but..." His lips were pressed tightly together, and he willed his gaze to slowly work his daughter back into focus. She was looking up at him with bleary eyes and a weak smile, and as his sleep-clouded eyes settled on her face, he began to notice her dishevelled appearance and flushed cheeks. Quickly, his embarrassment transformed into anger as the reality of the situation solidified in his mind. Not even having a moment to bathe, she was still fresh from the encounter, and the sight of it sent fits of violence throughout the Blacksmith's body.

"You're eighteen, for Talos' sake. Who did this to you?"

Svidi's insides flung from one side of the room to the other as her father shifted from one emotion to the next, and while she was preparing for one response, her father expected the next. Her jaw came unhinged and swung stupefied as her mind searched for an appropriate response, but because her mind was weary from a long journey and tired from her encounter, her mouth spoke before she could calculate the consequences. "Maul…" She whispered, slapping a trembling hand to her lips to stop her voice from further betraying her.

"Excuse me?" Balimund's eyes narrowed icily and his neck craned forward, daring his daughter to repeat the same. In truth, he had heard her as clear as day, but the idea of a sewer rat putting his paws on his daughter was too much for his honest mind to handle.

"Maul." She spoke more confidently, consciously squaring her shoulders to him and mentally preparing herself for the battle which would surely ensue from both her audacity and recklessness. She knew very well not only Maul's former position in the Thieve's Guild, but also her father's opinion of the faction which operated deep within the city's sewers.

"Are you trying to tell me that you've fucked one of those filthy animals?" One of Balimund's strong fingers jabbed painfully into Svidi's chest, and his sharp teeth gnashed together as he advanced on his daughter's much smaller frame.

Whatever semblance of strength Svidi had mustered had disappeared completely as she shuddered away from her father's antagonism. With barely a word forming on her drying tongue, only a small noise escaped her throat as she cowered backwards.

"I don't know what to tell you!" She finally cried, her tiny hands instinctively coming up to cover her face. If she had still been wearing her armor, one or both of the daggers strapped to her hips would have been in her hands. At this realization, she was rendered frozen and silent as she become conscious of two things: Firstly, she was frightened of her father. Secondly, she was capable of drawing a weapon on her father.

Balimund on the other hand, had stopped advancing some seconds before, as he had become aware of the first realization long before she had. The both of them stood opposite for a quiet, awkward minute before Balimund broke the silence.

"Honey…" His shoulders slumped and lost all tension they had during his rage, his face filled with remorse. "You know I wouldn't…"

"Yea..." Her voice was quiet; her tiny fingers twisted the cotton fabric of her nightgown intently. Her teeth gnawing away at the inside of her bottom lip, she willed herself to look at her father, though her eyes met his more out of determination than with any of the softness she had intended. Deeply ashamed that her experience outside of Riften's walls had soured her as much as they had, she could only think of apologizing. "I'm sorry…"

"No, Dee." Balimund's brow furrowed as he worked through his emotions, willing the sudden and unexpected sadness that he felt not to manifest on his face. Chin hardening, he looked at his daughter with moist eyes as he quickly turned to leave the room. "I can't-"Any more words would have sounded broken and revealed the lump which had formed in his throat. He resolved to continue their conversation in the afternoon after their emotions had settled, he had woken up, she had rested and for Talo's sake, taken a bath.


	2. Chapter 2

The sun rose and fell deep in the sky and Svidi slept, unaware of the passing hours. Thirteen of them had come and gone before her eyelids began to flutter, her body flipping left and right before this tossing became great enough to jerk her from sleep. Her flailing arms had jostled the furs off the bed, and her spine stiffened as she felt cold air rush over her sweat-drenched body.

Waking up today, like most days, felt eerily similar to the fateful one which had occurred some eight months ago, near the beginning of her journey out of Riften. She could almost feel the woman's cold eyes peering at her from a top a barren bookshelf as she fingered a menacing dagger at her hip. This phantom lingered behind Svidi's eyes as her foggy vision cleared the dreams, and Svidi realized she was alone, in her bed.

As the unsettling feeling left her, she rose and looked across the room where she had stripped herself of the signature black and red leather armor which had since been fit to her like a second set of skin, and had left her form as often as her first set has. An unusual cloud of emotions formed around her as she found herself unable to slip back into it, unsure of whether she felt comfortable displaying it in the city where people knew her quite differently. On one hand, the cat suit meant instant power and confidence; and on the other, this city had people within it who had grown fond of a more innocent and unassuming girl.

Either way, her sudden presence in Riften after a silent year away was going to present a unique set of problems in itself, so ultimately, she went with her gut. The chest of drawers across the room, which had since accumulated complex layers of dust since she'd last used them, had been emptied in her panic and she was left with only a simple dress she had worn while tending her father's forge. She felt foolish as she tied the apron around her hips, as her life had somehow twisted itself away from simplicity, and she stared at her foreign reflection.

The last time she had looked at herself in this mirror, she had appeared starkly different. Indeed, her past year was visible mostly in her eyes, which were more ice than ocean, though her body was not the soft, fatty shell she had before. Her thin, cold fingers reached for the simple ribbon she would use to tie her much shorter hair away from her face, and she looked at the long tangle of waves which now appeared out of place. Even the ribbon did nothing to return her to the life she had once known. The change ran deeper.

Balimund sat in front of a simple dinner of bread and cheese, preferring instead to spend the coin on the bottles of Black-briar Mead which lay empty in front of him. He uncorked his next with the palm of his thick, calloused hand and only acknowledged Svidi's appearance with a grunt as he drained nearly half of this bottle with a single gulp. Svidi was happy to see that the year had affected him little, and sat across from the blond Nord with a smile nearly playing on her lips.

"You're looking better." Her father mumbled, stuffing a large chunk of bread into his cheek and licking the crumbs from his fingers. In truth, he was trying his best to appear ordinary, though his thick eyebrows bunched slightly at the centered of his soot-covered forehead and easily revealed his apprehension, although only slightly.

"You're looking the same." Svidi's pleasure in this fact was apparent in her lightened voice, and Balimund was relieved that she had not only changed her attire, but her character as well. The two sat in silence, their minds both wandering back to the last time they had dined in this room, the subject unfortunately being the same one Balimund was attempting to get around to this evening. His plate forgotten, his guarded look wandered towards his daughter who sat with frustration muddled on her face, and Balimund hesitated.

"How was your trip?" He asked instead, though he was unsure whether he truly wanted the answer. His eyes lingered on Svidi as she wondered just how much to tell him, and he became increasingly aware of how difficult it had become to hold a conversation with her. Yet again he longed for his wife, because if she were around, he thought, Svidi never would have disappeared.

"Fine." She answered shortly, deciding not to include any of the details, as all of them would have led to explaining the next, and the end would have alarmed her father. "It was exactly what I needed."

"Good." He said, his eyes falling to his half eaten loaf of bread. He didn't know what to say next, but the silence was killing him. Whether by the effect of the alcohol, or the fact that he had little other to say, he dared broach upon the subject his daughter liked the least. "Look, Svidi…"

"Don't." She warned, her posture stiffening as she realized what he was about to say. If there was anything that she never wanted to hear uttered again, it was what her father was thinking, and was about to suggest. "Don't say it."

"He'd be good for you!" He roared, his eyes shooting towards her as his entire body pled with her to listen. "You need him."

"Not now, not ever!" She cried; utterly disgusted her father would even have the nerve to suggest the very thing which made her flee in the first place. The very thought repelled her, her body flung to the other side of the room by the mere idea of what he was suggesting. "He's horrible!"

"Sibbi Black-briar is the only man we know who isn't involved with that damn Guild and you're going to marry him!"

Svidi nearly laughed in his face. If it wasn't for her own involvement with the Guild, Sibbi and his mother, Maven, would have been exposed a long time ago. It could never be a valid argument against Sibbi. As a result, she was always backed into a corner, mumbling unintelligibly, when the topic was broached.

"Just stop." She said, begging him silent. "I'd marry my own brother before I'd consider Sibbi."

"Even Lynley is saying it's a good idea."

"You're joking!" Svidi couldn't believe that even her brother was blinded by the name of Black-briar. The older sibling had always possessed more sense than her, under a similarly dark nest of hair, and Svidi had a hard time believing this could be true.

"Yes, even he thinks you need a good husband. Why can't you see it?" Svidi bit her lip. The feeling inside her would be similar to the one you would get while standing on the edge of a cliff. Jumping off that cliff would clearly mean death, and the fall would be unpleasant. Walking away from that cliff is preferable, but now Lynley, a brother she greatly admires, was suggesting the jump would be good for her.

"I can't believe he's still waiting for me." She grumbled.

In the end she was just frustrated, and she couldn't believe she had let herself get closer to agreeing. One more step and she wouldn't have a choice, anymore. She would be falling.


	3. Chapter 3

There wasn't any other way Svidi would show herself in the sewers without some tangible manifestation of her success after the fact. To say her final appearance within the Guild was embarrassing would not be sufficient enough to cease the blood which flushed her cheeks each and every time she thought of it, and her fingers trembled as she tried to fasten the armor which would help her to hide these thoughts. This was a moment she had been dreading since leaving the sewers that day, and it was a moment which she thought would never have to pass.

Her heeled feet mounted the steps which led her through the house, allowing the power which came with the apparel to surge through her and give her confidence. Her eyes fell onto the man who was her brother, feeling his eyes cut into her as she found he knew exactly what she was. Something close to dread washed over his handsome face, and instead of upsetting Svidi, this new self lingered on his gaze and accepted what it meant. Her brother had always been too smart for his own good, and Svidi knew that she didn't need to voice any of her troubles; he could see them plainly on her face.

She pulled her hood over her features as far as it would go; knowing it would not hide a thing and the thieves, like her brother, would see through it. _No faults anymore, _she told herself. _I've now killed men much stronger than them, and I don't have anything to fear._ Her teeth ground together as she assembled her most determined look, and she slipped past the form of her tired father working busily at his trade, towards the stairs which would lead her towards her purpose.

Much thought went into what she would say upon arrival in the dark tavern which the thieves called home, and it wasn't until her feet had followed the familiar path to its end when she realized there really was nothing to say. Any apologies or explanations have been so long overdue that the event was probably only fresh and lingering in her own mind, and lost in theirs. The situation was so maddeningly unpredictable that she couldn't but steel herself for a few long moments before finally releasing the old door from her whitened grip and allowing it to swing out in front of her. Slowly, her eyes moved from the stone at her feet, to the pool of water in the middle of the room, to the tavern itself. The whole scene was so unusually the same that Svidi felt for the moment like she hadn't changed, and the nostalgia from her life pre-Sibbi rushed through her like a hurricane.

"What do you want, Brotherhood?" Came the low, grumbling voice of Dirge, who had been glaring at her for a while from his position on the small bridge between her and the Guild.

Immediately Svidi felt as if she had been doing everything the wrong way, all along. She shouldn't have disappeared so suddenly, been gone so long, and came back who she was. She was now standing in the armor marking her complete and total rebellion against the Guild, and everything her mentor had taught her. What was it that drove her to reject everything he had told her? What was it that drove her to come back and rub it in his face? This foolish audacity she now possessed was going to take away everything she had wanted before she had left; the single predator in her life was only herself.

"No, no, no." She sputtered, tripping over small pebbles as her legs urged her back into the tunnels behind her. She reluctantly found the eyes of the man she both never wanted to see again, yet had come solely to meet. His head had snapped up at the mention of the Dark Brotherhood, and his eyes lingered over her form, still unaware that his little pupil was hiding under the dark, scary hood. The light flooding out behind her cast her in complete, ambiguous shadow and Svidi still had a chance to make her initial return a sweet one.

"She's with me." His gruff, accented voice called out, and there was no longer a way Svidi could escape. Her sluggish feet pulled her forwards, closer to the event that would either ease or amplify the anxiety which had burdened her for fourteen months. Vex's face twisted up with disgust as Svidi drew nearer; and whether that was the effect of the Brotherhood, keen observation, or something else, was unclear to all. It resulted in a quick adjustment in the hood covering Svidi's face, and she became painfully aware of how bright it was under the torchlight by the bar. Keeping her head down, she hoped he wouldn't look too closely as she took the chair opposite him.

"Heard 'bout what happened," He shifted his weight onto his elbows as he leaned towards her, dropping his voice to an almost inaudible murmur. "Real shame, that was. Glad the Brotherhood's still kickin' though, eh?"

He took a swig from the tankard glued to his right hand. Svidi could barely hear him over the steady rhythm throbbing in her ears, drowning out every second word he spoke. She kept her eyes focused on the lone Septim he had left on the table for the barkeep, determined to keep her head down, words minimal, and identity secret. She was relieved she had done at least one thing right in the past year, and had the forethought to send a courier with news of her arrival.

"Not much of a talker, eh? Nah, not many of your kind are." He laughs. Svidi nearly glanced up to look at his face. She could feel his eyes boring into her, finished with the small talk. She reached for the heavy bag she'd hung from her hip, tossing it onto the table between them.

"Right." He said, with a look that was the same as every thief's would be, greedy, and he snatched up the coin purse faster than anyone could have turned to see it. "I'll put this to good use." Svidi nodded, and rose to leave.

"Wait a minute," He caught her arm, and the motion brought her face much closer than she would have liked. "Where's a pretty thing like you going so fast?"

Memories of their last encounter shook her down to her marrow, and her frightened eyes shot upwards in disbelief. In the final moment Svidi was his student in stealth over one year ago, Delvin Mallory had clearly stated his disinterest. How could he now give his attention so blatantly? Was it merely Svidi as a person whom he could never picture as his partner? Clearly. He released her arm as quickly as he had claimed it, and she staggered away from him. Both of their jaws came unhinged as the awkwardness came flooding back. Neither had words, but Vex did.

"Fuck me." She said, as the hood fell back on Svidi's shoulders.


End file.
